Paralumino Announces New Products/Services

#1

Press Release
Paralumino Releases HDR Capsule, Buxton HDRI, and Fact Furniture models.
27 February 2008

Los Angeles, California

Paralumino Creative Studios is proud to announce three new products designed to contribute to the creative process of EIAS users and all other applications capable of utilizing high dynamic range imagery and datasets.

HDR Capsule: This collection of HDR images is designed to mimic a wide range of distortion patterns, solitary lighting setups and studio lighting setups. Options include:

- Distortions: This collection of 24 HDR images provides unique distortion patters 	for global reflections and refractions thus increasing the sense of realism in GI 	renderings. 

- Solo Illuminators: This collection of 24 HDR images provides single light 	sources using four different light types. Umbrella, Box, Grid and Array. 

- Studio Lights: This larger collection of 52 HDR images provides multiple 	configurations of lighting setups typically found in a photographer’s studio. Types 	of lights include Wall Strips, Hexes, Layered Lights, Multi-bulb and Quad Box.

Selling for a mere $30 per collection, this is a cost effective method of adding more realism to GI lit scenes. Available immediately through electronic download.

Buxton HDRI: Brian Buxton, photographer, gathers up his 360 panoramic camera to take magnificent snapshots of the Spanish country side and its architecture. These HDRI files are available in ultra high 8k and 4k resolution and feature layouts in Spherical, Lightprobe, Skydome, Horizontal and Vertical Cross formats. Over 25 exterior and interior shots are available for individual purchase and electronic download. More panoramas are planned. Aggressively priced at $25 per location, each electronic download includes high resolution files in all layouts and low resolution previews for reference.

The Factory: This service is to provide EIAS users with a repository of high quality FACT models that are fully UV’d and prepped for use in any scene. Each model comes with its own set of texture maps and corresponding EIAS project file guaranteed to provide you with near photo realistic output. OBJ file equivalents are planned for each model in The Factory in the following weeks. Prices start at $20 per model and are available via electronic download. Perfect for architectural renderings and digital sets. Bundles are planned but currently not available. Modelers interested in providing FACT or OBJ files for The Factory for resale are encouraged to contact Paralumino.

For more information please visit: www.paralumino.com

#2

Wow! Lots of new stuff. Time to shop…

#3

Great news and great products!! The Facts at last! :smiley:

I have a question for Dave :slight_smile:

How similar are the ‘Studio Lights’ to using area lights?
They kinda seem like they would produce a similar effect to me (and certainly very quickly!)… Any chance of seeing a render showing the shadows they produce?? The little previews on the store don’t show me enough to be able to tell…

Can’t wait to get them bought!!!
Ian

#4

Hey Ian…

Brian has more Facts coming…this is just the first wave.

#5

These work very well for this.
The Solo Illuminators cast very directional but soft shadows.
I’ll work on a few previews and post soon!
Dave :wink:

#6

Attached is a better render sample using one of the HDR images from HDR Capsule:Studio Lights.
You can see the very soft shadows created from the Adaptive Skymap as well as a combination of RT Reflection Skymap, and GI Glossy effects.

All of the HDRs are meant to give good results right away at the default settings, so you don’t have to wrestle with the controls to get results. But some simple tweaks can be useful.

Because these images were “engineered” rather than photographed, they have some special properties. For all of the images in the Studio Lights series, the saturation from the light sources is controllable using the clamping control within Animator. You can see in the sample that pulling the clamping down to about 30% of the max pulls most of the color out of the light sources, but leaves the soft shadows intact.

As for speed, these images used 400 Primary rays, and rendered on my “old” 2ghz G5 in 6:30s. Not too shabby :wink:

I hope everyone will find these useful!

I’ll be sharing some more things soon!
As always, feedback is welcome :wink:

Dave

#7

Any chance of a special introductory HDR Capsule bundle price?
I want all three.

JM

#8

Dave,

You just killed LightPlane… :wink:

Ian :slight_smile:

#9

Hi James,
Sorry, we don’t have any bundle pricing or discounts right now.

The nearest competitor to HDR Capsule is actually more expensive.
As we were discussing pricing, I wanted to have very aggressive pricing up front, so that these sets would be affordable for everyone without “sale pricing” or other games.

I hope you find HDR Capsule a good value! :slight_smile:

#10

Since these HDRIs are available to all apps, will you put the PR on the main page? :slight_smile:

Ian

#11

Probably a good idea to include the forums for Lightwave, Maya/MentalRay, etc. too!

#12

Plus most websites specialized in industrial design, automotive design, archviz and such. Also, most 3D app vendors’ ones, I guess.

#13

Talking of broader 3D
I will be releasing OBJ formats of my Fact furniture models in a couple of weeks or so.
Just need to decide what to use to render the previews and to double check everything to ensure there are no unwanted issues.

BB

#14

Hi Brian,
I don’t think there is any need to re-render. Every renderer is going to be a little different, so just use what you have now.
The EIAS previews look really great! :slight_smile:

Fantastic collection BTW!
Dave

#15

Thanks Dave very nice for you to say so.

I’m not so experienced with rendering from EIAS especially without 3rd party shaders.
I got EIAS for it’s modeler above all else so you can imagine how excited I am about Telsa!!

If you ever have the time/inclination it would be great to glean a few lighting/shading tips from you! You may notice in the previews that the speculars are a bit weak & I’ve yet to render a decent velvet…

BB

#16

Well as soon as I can get the webpage redesigned, I plan to make it quite apparent that all these new products play well with other applications…but EI will always be first. :slight_smile:

#17

Velvet, now THERE’S a material challenge! :slight_smile:

#18

OK here’s a little goodie for everyone. Absolutely free.
This should help anyone trying to re-orient skydomes.

www.arketypedesign.com/Downloads/SkyDomeController.zip

This also includes a very low resolution HDR skymap of a single hex shaped lightsource. This is very similar to what you will find in HDR Capsule: Solo Illuminators. :wink:

Please remember that Paralumino now has multiple options for HDRI images should you need any… www.paralumino.com

I hope everyone enjoys this!

Dave :smiley:

#19

Hi Dave,

Nice product and very well priced indeed.

I assume the maps are all spherical and the small blured one’s are meant for skymaps, the large ones for reflection ?

I just thought you might want to include this info in with the product, it would help the less experienced users out there.

I’ve had a small amount of time using these HDR’s and they look pretty good so far, thanks for your effort on this.

Reuben

#20

I’m very pleased with the product, and have been getting nice results using the tiny blurred images as sky maps. But I agree more hints as to usage would have been nice.

Reuben, how far does the HDRI get you on product shots? Do you still have to add other lights and/or reflective objects? Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Jim Mulcahy